She dreamed too

 With Mother's day just around the corner our thoughts just naturally turn in that direction. I saw an article that was republished in the Times about Moms. This article was an essay about how Moms were real people too, just like all the rest of us. Mom had a past. And I thought, yes, I'm aware that my mother had a past, that she was young once and did stuff. Stuff, that in fact I'd rather not know about. It rather ruins the illusion for me. I'd much rather remember her as I knew her. Whatever mistakes, failures or poor choices she made in her youth I don't need to know about. Do I think of her as a hero? No, she wasn't a hero, she was just mom. But it seems to me these days we are busy destroying all the heroes of yesterday. I think that is because we want to somehow justify ourselves today. By the removal of heroes, we lower the standard. That's the long and short of that. That's doubly true when we remove those everyday heroes. The everyday heroes like our Moms. 

 We all know that our Moms had different lives. If you've been around long enough to get married and have children of your own, you just smile at all that. You had a different life once too. You have learned that the mistakes of the past, no matter how much fun those mistakes may have been, are best left in the past. You may say to your children, I've made mistakes in the past, but you don't have to. The truth is, they do, and they will. It's what we call experience. Can't get experience from a book, only ideas. Experience and experimentation are what is required. But like any great inventor you don't tell of all the failures, only the success. Oh, you say how you have to keep trying, not give up, but it is the accomplishment you brag about, not the failure. And yes, our heroes all had their failures. They were all just people like you and me. 

 It is that fact, the fact that all heroes are just people like you and I that is being used to destroy the heroes of the past. That is being accomplished not only by telling of their mistakes, shortcomings and failures, but by declaring everyone today as a hero. It is something that bothers me. I served in the Navy but I'm no hero. The local Policeman on the block isn't a hero because he's a cop. Being a hero isn't something you sign up for! You can't just assume a job or a position and instantly become a hero. That isn't how that is supposed to work. When everyone gets the medals, the medals are every day. The meaning, the significance is lost. Today we only need to erect a flagpole halfway, the flag is at half-staff more times than not. That significance is lost to me. As a result, the heroes just blend into the everyday. 

 Well, I guess I'm just not woke. I'll stay in this slumber of mine thank you very much. I'll remember my mom for who I knew her to be. That is what makes her mom. I'm aware of her shortcomings and her foibles. I've heard stories from others that knew her; when. But that's the thing, that was when. As I remember her, it is now. While working on the family tree, assembling all the facts, the data of a life, I have become aware of certain realities. Things never given a thought before. The age of my mother when she had her first child, her marital status, things like that. Raw data doesn't contain feelings, reasons or explanations. It just is. I don't want or need to know the dirt. That isn't what interests me. Save that stuff for the movies and the news. All that does is tarnish the memory. It provides an excuse. Everyone is doing it. Thing is, heroes do the things that others don't! That's what makes them a hero. And my memory of my mother is what makes her mom. I'm good with that. She doesn't need to be a hero at all, not the point. She's Mom. Knowing her failures won't change who I am. I'll just remember the way it was. 

 Some of you may remember this Glen Campbell tune: this is the first verse

"She looks in the mirror, and stares at the wrinkles that
Weren't there yesterday
And thinks of the young man that she almost married
What would he think if he saw her this way?" 

Such are the dreams of the everyday housewife.   Mom.